I am not very skilled at sculpting so if anyone has any ideas at all on how to create this cake (his nose is huge!), I would love to hear them. And any tips on sculpting would be greatly appeciated as well.

WOW! That is one big nose! Hmm...trying to think outside the nose, I mean box, here... You might just want to to a Styrofoam ball covered in fondant for that and not even stress yourself out with trying to sculpt something.

It would be lightweight and you could stick it on his face with a dowel. I don't really know what to tell you about the rest of the face, though. Well, you maybe could get your cake ready, lay a cutout of Yoshi's face on it and trim around it. Then by using the pic of the other cake as a guide of sorts, start shaping some little pieces to lay on top out of rice krispy treats. Meaning for the cheek area, make a sort of shallow half sphere and then put it on the cake (affixing it with buttercream or royal icing?). Then cut out or shape some more for the bulge of the top of his eyes, lay it on, etc. Basically you'd have a cake with pieces of krispy treats all over it like the way the recreate faces off skulls (sorry, can't think of how to describe it).

Then go ahead and lay your fondant pieces over the whole thing. Looks like they start with a white base, add the green layer, etc.

Yes the nose is huge! I think though because they made a cake of just the head the main focus here is the nose unfortunately.

Have you possibly considered make a regular tiered cake with a smaller Yoshi on top? Possible make him out of rice krispie and fondant.

This looks like a potential nightmare cake. From what it looks like to me they might have bought a styrofoam ball and used that for the nose but it is just too big. Definitely distracting from the actual character itself.

Thanks to both of you for your input!! I really appreciate it. That picture definitely does look like it might be a little easier. I have a month to play with ideas so whichever way I decide to go, it'll be well planned out. Wish me luck and thanks again!!

Whenever I have to do large items on a cake that are supposed to look like part of the cake I just use Rice Krispy Treates and hand mold them to whatever shape is needed, and then cover them in fondant. If you want it to look smooth you can brush the shape with melted chocolate before covering with fondant. For that nose I would make a RKT ball, brush with melted chocolate, a thin layer of icing and then cover it in fondant a Dowel right through the while thing should keep it sturdy and in place